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My favourite vacation tech present doesn’t require batteries or software program updates. It’s not even a gadget, although it was made with expertise.
Are you able to guess what it’s?
A couple of years in the past, my spouse experimented along with her iPad and a digital stylus to make digital illustrations. Utilizing Procreate, a drawing app, she loaded a photograph of our beloved corgi, Max, as a reference to hint over earlier than embellishing the picture with a polka-dot bow tie and a cartoonishly lengthy tongue. I favored it a lot that I picked a background shade that will complement our house and uploaded the illustration to the app Souvenir, a printing service that assembles your photos in a pleasant body earlier than delivering it to your door.
A big, framed portrait of Max now hangs as a centerpiece in our lounge in all its two-dimensional glory. It makes me smile and is all the time a dialog starter when now we have visitors over. That’s greater than I can say about different tech presents that I’ve obtained through the years, comparable to video video games and good audio system, which solely introduced short-lived pleasure.
This kind of gifting train — tech-adjacent presents that don’t contain {hardware} or inconsiderate Greatest Purchase present playing cards — could also be particularly welcome this yr. That’s as a result of we live in a pandemic-induced period of shortage pushed by a world chip scarcity and provide chain disruptions which have made typical presents troublesome to purchase. (Anybody attempting to purchase a sport console for the final yr understands this ache.)
So right here’s a listing of concepts for tech presents we may give with out truly shopping for tech, from the presents you may create to experiences that can final a lifetime.
The present of fixing
Final week, I informed a good friend I had a particular current for her: I’d repair her iPhone downside.
She had complained to me about her five-year-old iPhone SE. The machine might now not take pictures or set up software program updates as a result of almost all the machine’s information storage was used up.
So earlier than she left for her Thanksgiving trip, I met her for lunch and walked her via the method of backing up pictures to an exterior drive earlier than purging all the photographs from the machine. Then I plugged her cellphone into a pc to again up all her information earlier than putting in the brand new working system.
She was thrilled to have this downside fastened earlier than her journey. She will now take numerous pictures on trip. Plus, a brand new Apple software program replace has a instrument so as to add a digital vaccine card to the iPhone’s pockets app, which makes vacation journey barely much less annoying within the pandemic.
For many who are considerably tech savvy, this will function a template. Take heed to your family members’ complaints about their tech and provide the present of fixing the issue. If it’s a sluggish Wi-Fi connection, see in the event you can diagnose the problem to spice up speeds. If it’s a short-lived cellphone battery, take into account taking them to a restore store to get the battery changed for a small sum.
In some methods, this beats giving a brand-new gadget as a result of it spares them the trouble of studying tips on how to use a brand new piece of tech.
The present of creation
Other than the instance of the digital illustration of my canine, there are many different methods we will use tech to create for family and friends.
For one, I’m a fan of picture books that may simply be created with internet instruments. A couple of years in the past, a colleague’s Secret Santa present for me was a calendar she made utilizing Google’s picture books service. She created it by pulling pictures from my canine’s Instagram account and compiling them right into a calendar — every month was a special picture of Max posing subsequent to an entree cooked by my spouse and me. I used to be delighted.
Normally, photo-printing companies provide good methods to show digital pictures into bodily keepsakes within the type of old-school, massive prints and even mugs and Christmas ornaments. (Wirecutter, our sister publication that opinions merchandise, examined two dozen photo-printing companies and highlighted its favorites.)
Earlier than the pandemic upended our lives, my spouse purchased a DSLR, the kind of digital digicam utilized by professionals, with the aim of studying extra about digital images. Then the lockdowns occurred, holidays changed into staycations and the digicam ended up dwelling in a drawer.
My plan for a vacation current for my spouse is a two-hour digital images lesson with a photograph studio in San Francisco that takes college students on a stroll throughout the Golden Gate Bridge whereas educating the basics of images. (Hopefully she doesn’t learn this column.)
What would your family and friends prefer to study? We’ve got loads of choices for potential present courses, for the reason that pandemic drove many lecturers to supply digital instruction on-line, together with for cooking classes and exercise routines. The present of information goes a great distance and generally offers again, like when the recipient of on-line cooking classes makes use of that newfound information to make you dinner.
The present of no tech
The pandemic might have uncovered us to extra display time than we might ever think about enduring, so an incredible present this yr may be something that takes our consideration away from tech.
That may very well be renting a cabin in an space with no mobile service, tickets to a play, a winter hike and a picnic — something that offers us respite from our inevitable return to screens.
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Supply- nytimes